


Always.

by myloveiamthespeedofsound



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Hello mutual pining my old friend, I've come to write with you again, but still fluff, some blood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-11
Updated: 2016-11-11
Packaged: 2018-08-30 07:17:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8523658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myloveiamthespeedofsound/pseuds/myloveiamthespeedofsound
Summary: I have no summary. It's fluffy and nice. And probably the least angsty thing I've written. Yay summary.





	

**Author's Note:**

> For the Romanogers fluffathon. Set some vague time between Avengers and TWS.
> 
> And image inspiration is [this ](http://myloveiamthespeedofsound.tumblr.com/post/151116965841)

Missions were never a walk in the park necessarily, but some are always a little bit easier on paper than others. This?  This had not been one of those missions. This had been one of those complicated, terrible, life or death missions that they had only barely scrapped their way out of. The kind that had shaken and rattled, that they'd narrowly escaped. They all but stumbled into the safe house as Natasha, bleeding profusely, leaned heavily on Steve for support.

She hissed a breath as he tripped a little over an area rug.  “Shit, sorry,” he said quickly and moved them toward the bathroom.

“Language, Rogers,” she chided, despite the severity of the situation. 

“Yeah, yeah…” he muttered as he helped her to sit on the closed toilet seat. He turned around a few times in the small space, looking more than a little rattled and lost. 

Natasha winced. Her hand was pressed to the knife wound on her side, blood between her fingers. “Under the sink,” she instructed. When that didn't seem to do much to get the damn man to focus she snapped the fingers of her free hand. He looked to her with a blank expression.  “Steve,” she said pointedly, “under the sink, preferably  _ before _ I bleed out.”

Steve nodded and then moved to grab the medical kit from under the sink. He placed it on the counter and set about digging out what was needed.  He grabbed the autoinjector pen filled with morphine first.  Which was easy enough.  He popped the cap and held her gaze as he jabbed it into her thigh.  He knew it probably wouldn’t hit quick enough to dull the pain of being stitched, but it would hopefully kick in quickly regardless.

He dropped the pen on the counter and grabbed the scissors.  He turned to Natasha and paused as his hand moved to the hem of her shirt, scissors in his other hand. He gulped somewhat, as he could  feel the blood that soaked the garment - some god awful pink, low cut shirt that had been worn as her cover.  There was  _ so much blood _ and he could barely remember how to breathe.  He felt the guilt wash over him at the sight.  He should have done better, he should have  _ been _ better.  He should not be feeling her blood warm and sticky between her fingers because he never should have let her get hurt in the first place.     
  
“Steve,” Natasha said again.     
  
He shook his head and cut the shirt.  She didn’t need him to drown in his own guilt right then, his own worry at the paleness of her face and the blood on her shirt.  She sure as hell didn’t need him to not be able to handle it because he’d done something idiotic along the line and let his feelings get the better of him when it came to her.  No, she needed him to  _ fix _ it right then.  Nothing more and nothing less.  Just fix it.   
  
His hands gently pushed the fabric away from the wound.  It wasn’t the  _ worst _ he realized as he saw it up close.  But it wasn’t good either.  He turned back to the kit and threaded the needle.  His heart hammered in his chest and he let out a slow breath.  He didn’t want to be shaking, he didn’t want to fuck it up.  He kneeled in front of her and held her gaze.  “Okay?” he asked, though he wasn’t sure if he was asking her or himself.  She nodded and he let his eyes fall back to her skin.  And then he saw it.  Black ink along her ribs, that disappeared under the strap of her bra.    
  
_ “You should draw me something sometime,” Natasha said plainly as they sat in the cafeteria of SHIELD.  She had her fingers wrapped around a coffee cup, a muffin on her plate.  Steve’s breakfast had been devoured in about ten seconds flat and they had settled into a nice silence as he started sketching on the napkin.  A rare morning where they actually had free time, when they didn’t have to run to a briefing or training, when they could just enjoy the other’s company.  Something they had both started to realize they liked in the weeks following Fury partnering them.  _

_ “Oh I should, should I,” Steve teased lightly as he looked up at her, a smile on his lips.  “What kind of something?” he asked. _

_ Natasha shrugged and took a sip of her coffee.  “Just something,” she replied.  “Something that you think suits me,” she suggested. _

_ Steve watched her as she took another drink.  There were two women he had quickly realized.  There was Natasha Romanoff, the infamous Black Widow, who had a calm that he at times more than envied.  And then there was Natasha Romanoff the woman who was just that.  A woman.  Full of warmth and compassion to those she deemed worthy of it.  Full of jokes that were almost as terrible as his, the kind of woman who would show up at his door and declare his wardrobe a disaster before dragging him out for a much needed update.  Natasha Romanoff who had fought tooth and nail for the freedom she now had.  And God, how admirable that was.   _ __  
_  
_ __ It was an easy draw when his mind put the pieces together.  Two delicate little birds, one above the other.  The two sides of the coin that was Natasha Romanoff.  Free, graceful, beautiful.  And when he handed it to her three days later without much fanfare, he swore he could see her eyes mist over.  

“Steve,” she said again, her own heart hammered in her chest.  Adrenaline from the injury and the knowing that now  _ he knew. _  That she hadn’t just been asking for some simple drawing for her wall, or to tuck into some drawer and look at.  No, she had been asking for something else entirely.  Something she hadn’t been able to tell him.  But it didn’t change the very real fact that she was in dire need of attention.

“So-sorry,” he stammered out and focused on the task at hand.  With his hand steady he pulled her skin back together.  His breath was slow and purposeful, and he forced himself to stay calm even as she hissed in little pangs of pain.  He could freak out later.  He worked as quick as he could, not wanting to cause her more distress and soon enough the wound was stitched and bandaged.     
  
“Good as new,” he said with a shaky voice as his fingers lingered over the line where the bandage met her skin.  He looked up to hold her gaze, hers glassy now with the morphine hitting her system.  He gently tugged at her hand and helped her to stand.  “Is this okay,” he asked as he pulled at her shirt and waited for a nod before he removed the garment entirely.   Her skin was pale, beautiful, and despite the situation oh how he wanted right then.  His eyes roamed -  _ wrong, wrong, wrong,  _ he chided himself at the move - over her torso, the pale skin littered with dried blood and then the tattoo.  The black ink that mirrored his drawing, but with a small addition.  A splash of colour, in a watercolour style, to each of the wings.  A pale shade of red on one bird and blue on the other.   
  
He tore his gaze away and managed to keep her steady with one hand while his other reached for a cloth by the sink.  He wet it down with warm water, squeezed the excess off. He gently started to wash off some of the dried blood - she would need a shower once she felt better but it would at least help a little.  “Aren’t you going to ask?” she said, slurred really as the drugs raced through her system.  It was a testament to her trust in the man who held her steady that she even  _ let _ the morphine affect her as it was.  That she didn’t fight against the way it blurred the world a little, the way she knew she could lay down and sleep dead to the world for an hour.  Steve had her.  Steve would keep her safe.   
  
“Ask what?” he said softly as he kept gently washing the blood off her skin. He was keenly aware that this was the most he had ever touched a woman, and his hand trembled slightly as he dragged the cloth along her lower abdomen.  

“About the tattoo,” she prompted. Maybe it was the morphine - but she knew it  _ wasn't -  _ and she hitched a breath as his fingers danced lightly over the ink on her skin. Her eyes focused on the line of his jaw from underneath her lashes, and she found herself having to work very hard at not reaching her hand up to brush against his skin. 

He shrugged lightly. “Figured you'll tell me when you want to,” he answered. He held her gaze and he could see her tongue dart out to wet her lips. He had to remind himself of the morphine in her system, the very real knife wound he'd just patched up. Even though he  _ wanted _ nothing more than to close the space between them that had somehow gotten pretty damn small, it wouldn't be right. 

He gave her a soft smile and set the cloth back down.  His arms wrapped around her and he gently lifted her, carried her into the adjoining bedroom and laid her down on the bed. “Get some sleep,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed. “I'll keep watch and arrange exfiltration.”

Natasha let her hand move to graze over his. She wanted to say something, but she wasn't sure  _ what  _ at that exact moment. So instead she just nodded and let her eyes fall shut as he squeezed her hand. 

It was dark outside when she woke, and she felt the groggy feeling of having spent the previous hours knocked out.  There was a bedside light on though and she could see Steve in the chair on the other side of the room.  He had,  _ of course _ , found a few scraps of paper and a pen in the safehouse and had the paper on a book resting on his leg, the pen moving across the page.  She smiled a little at the sight.  She curled her fingers around the edge of the blanket he must have laid over her and just watched for a moment before she spoke. 

“I liked the idea of having something of you with me, always,” she said softly.  A delayed answer to the question he hadn’t even asked.    
  
Steve glanced up as she spoke, and her words caused a skip in his heart.  He placed the book, papers and pen down and nodded slowly.  He stood and as he crossed the small room he dug through the pocket of his jeans.  He sunk back down onto the bed beside her and smiled as he held out the trinket - a dime she had found God knew where, 1917.  Something she had handed to him with a great amount of glee one afternoon - _ ha! Found something that’s even older than you, Rogers. _

He turned it between his fingers before he set it on the bedside table.  Natasha sat up in the bed, the blanket pulled up under her chin on her knees.  He watched her, quiet, and then reached a hand across to brush his knuckles across her cheek.  A bold move, but she smiled softly at the touch and so he let his hand slide around the back of her neck.  “Guess I liked the idea of having something of you with me, too,” he said.  His thumb brushed along her lower lip and she sighed softly.  “I like the idea of having  _ you _ with me,” he swallowed hard, his stomach a knot of nerves, “always,” he added.

“I kind of like that too,” she replied softly.  An admitting of this  _ thing _ they had that they’d been dancing around for weeks -  _ months _ \- now.  She leaned forward and slid a hand behind his neck.  “You sure about this?” she asked as she hesitated just before reaching his mouth with hers.

  
He gave her a crooked grin.  “It’ll be fun,” he paraphrased her from their first fight together.  She grinned at that and he tugged her in the rest of the way to press his lips to hers, more certain of  _ them _ than he had been about anything in years. 


End file.
